As 2013 ended, a senior IT manager for a global energy company confided to me that he believes the world is becoming a "less friendly place" to do business. When asked what he meant, he told me that with the revelations of NSA spying, military posturing of the Russian government, and the continuing strife in the Middle East coupled with technology-related issues such as high-frequency trading and multinational hacking rings, it seemed that more and more people were making business decisions with an eye toward risk mitigation.